Evaluation of Impressions toward People with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities using the Semantic Differential Method
Junichi Takahashi, Ayana Haga

Abstract
We examined impressions towards people with disabilities by using a semantic differential (SD) method. Participants (N = 105, 40 men and 65 women) rated video scenes featuring a person with intellectual and developmental disabilities, on 20 adjective-pair scales, for 10 minutes. In addition, they completed questionnaire, investigating degree of recognition of various disabilities. Using principal factor analysis, we extracted 3 factors: Evaluation, Activity, and Potency. Furthermore, we compared factor scores between male and female and between participants with high and low degrees of recognition of disabilities in each factors. We found sex differences only in Evaluation. Moreover, we found individual differences in the degrees of recognition of disabilities in Evaluation and Potency, but not in Activity. These results showed the factor structure within attitude formation towards people with disabilities and indicated that sex differences and individual differences in the degree of recognition of various disabilities affected attitude formation.

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